


The (Other) Lives of Others

by VerticalDrive



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Adora and Catra are roommates, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, And you live in the apartment next to them, But that seemed a bit much even for me, Domestic bliss for them, Everyone says "by the old gods" a lot, F/F, F/M, Gender of the protagonist is up to you, I briefly considered "The Lesbians Next Door: No Country for Cold Introverts" as the title, Paranoia for you, Perfuma says stop importing exotic plants it's bad for the ecosystem, Second-Person Perspective, This is a great source of distress for you
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-17 16:48:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28852350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VerticalDrive/pseuds/VerticalDrive
Summary: The plan? You just need to survive this final year at Bright Moon University. Keep your head down, eyes open, on the straight and narrow. You're sober, you're clean, you're out of the game, you're good. You can't mess this up, not after getting this far.Except it looks like you have new neighbors. A human... and a magicat. And they have a lot of friends.The city of Bright Moon is a very interesting place. This city will very likely kill you.
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra), Angella/Micah (She-Ra), Bow/Glimmer (She-Ra), Kyle/Lonnie/Rogelio (She-Ra), Mermista/Sea Hawk (She-Ra), Perfuma/Scorpia (She-Ra)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 27





	1. Hearing voices, and moving a couch.

The first and last hint you get is the warbling sound of voices echoing up from the stairwell.

See, get this: most people living around here think they’re way too good for stairs and would wait for the elevator instead. (Weird, given their attiring with expensive celebrity-sponsored athleticwear and paid exercise apps on their phones and performance-tracking ‘smart’ watches on their well-moistured wrists and personal trainers and exclusive gym memberships, but… that’s the big city, for you.) But if it’s the stairwell? Either they’re too impatient to wait, too drunk to figure out the elevator buttons, or…

Your hand is resting upon the burnished golden doorknob (excessive, really) to your apartment. You frown. You could let these mysterious voices ghosting up to you go, but… you’re a curious person and in the spirit of that characterization your curiosity gets the better of you. (This has, in the past, been a serious problem and led to serious bodily and financial and egoistic harm.) You unfurl your fingers from your doorknob and trot over to the stairwell door. You open it as quietly as possible and peer down over the steel rails.

You see two women struggling to maneuver a giant (pink… purple?) mutant of a couch up the metal steps—and you’re pretty impressed they got as far as they did, having battled those very steps in the not-so-distant past. They alternate between bickering with each other like an old married couple in an 80’s sitcom and cursing the couch to the fieriest depths of upholstered hell.

As though you are a videogame character, two options make themselves obvious to you: should you be a complete asshole and do nothing, or be less of a complete asshole and help?

Fuck.

“Fuck,” you mutter. In the stairwell, the soundwaves ricochet up and down thanks to the acoustics. Both women stop and look up at you, blinking.

Fuck.

“Need some help?” You call down with what you think is a totally cool aloofness. 

“Sure!” One of them calls up without missing a beat. You blink; you asked automatically out of politeness and to fill the awkward silence. Now you’re wrangled into actually doing this. Damn. As you descend the steps two at a time (four at a time led to a dramatic fall once, yes you were drunk, whatever), you actually get a look at who these unknown furniture-movers are. You stop a bit prematurely once their appearances sink in.

The first woman is pale and blonde and blue-eyed, hair pulled into a high ponytail yet adorned with an odd poof at the crest of her head. There’s a sturdy ease to her stance, a kind of resting smile on her face as she looks up at you patiently and appreciatively. It’s somewhat disarming; it makes you feel like she’s more like an old friend you haven’t seen in a decade you used to call “bro” rather than a complete stranger who may or may not murder you in your sleep. The red jacket and blue jeans (with a golden belt buckle that’s a little too big…) complete the image. She’s… clearly not from these parts.

The second woman is why you stopped.

She’s… a fucking magicat.

At a distance, you only saw the sort-of tamed mane of her hair, too short for a ponytail but long enough to make you reach for a hair tie anyway. But now… now you see the ears. And they are, literally, catlike. Dark brown and furred and… you realize her _entire body_ is covered in fur. It’s short, really short—like the fuzz on a peach. Well, no… it’s like that on her face (short enough to see the constellation of freckles bridging her nose). Her forearms are more… dense. She’s wearing a hooded sweatshirt that’s clearly too big for her with the sleeves rolled up, and—there it is. A tail, flicking back and forth. Whoa. One eye azure, one eye amber stare up at you. The iris constrict… horizontally. They’re cat eyes, holy fuck. Wait. Wait wait wait. Constriction is bad.

You realize you’ve been staring for a solid three seconds. And, in utter silence, three seconds is a long, long time. It’s time to salvage this.

“Sorry,” you say, mostly to buy time. “I didn’t know someone was moving in. Usually there’s talk on the forum.”

They both glance at each other. “There’s… a forum?” The blonde says, brow furrowed.

You shrug. “It’s supposed to be a… you know. A ‘community’ thing. But mostly a place for feuds and gossip.” You’re probably not selling them on this place. “Not that I participate! Just… watch.” Yeah, that’s not creepy or anything. “Anyway!” You come down the final steps and latch onto a corner of the couch (settee…?).

So you help. Or try to, as your hands sink into the plush couch alarmingly quickly and you’re suddenly staring at your wrists. “Oh fuck,” you mutter. 

The magicat woman laughs. “That’s what I said.” Her partner shoots her a look.

“We were _not_ leaving Beatrix behind,” she says firmly.

“Just because Glimmer gave us the couch—” The magicat woman flicks her gaze to you for a moment, looking slightly embarrassed. “The couch came with the name, we didn’t come up with it.”

“I’ve heard stranger things,” you say conversationally (you think), grunting as the rail jabs you in your low ribs. How the hell did they get this thing this far? “What floor?”

“Ten,” the blonde says, a bit breathless. 

Oh.

Oh, shit.

“Got it,” you say, voice neutral. 

It’s probably only two more minutes to transport the couch heavenwards, but it feels like a long ass time. Not because physical exertion stretches time out, but because you keep stealing glances at your new story-mates. Well… it’s more like 30% the human, 70% the magicat. She catches you, once, and you cut your eyes away quickly.

“Here we are!” you say, maybe a little too loudly as you kick open the landing door. 

“At the end of the hall,” the human says. 

Something cold pools in the pit of your stomach.

The three of you carry the damnable burden to the apartment door. The magicat woman produces the key, unlocks it, and pushes the door open enough all of you too—

When you get a glance of their apartment, you stop.

It looks like it was lifted directly out of an interior design magazine. Yeah, the people in this apartment are considered ‘moneyed’ in one way or another, but this is… whoa. The pink-purple couch looks totally out of place.

The human suggests they leave it in the living room for now, so you do. After all of you catch your breath (it doesn’t take too long, it’s just a couch, not a load of ferrous ore), you feel the awkward sense that you’re intruding in someone else’s space. You begin to gradually slide toward the door, inch by—

“Thanks!” the blonde woman says, beaming at you. You’re briefly dazzled by her teeth. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“Yeah, well,” you answer weakly.

“My name’s Adora,” she continues on, sticking out her hand. 

You take it and shake it. She has a confident grip, callused, strong. Somehow, you feel reassured. About what, or why, you don’t know. “Yeah… I should’ve sad before. I’m—”

The sound of bouncy pop in a language you don't know reverberates through the apartment. Adora gives a slight start, then yanks her phone out of her back pocket. “Sorry, sorry! Can I…?”

You wave her off. “Go ahead.”

She smiles again (it’s so open and honest it makes you guilty about nothing) and taps the screen. “Glimmer! Don’t worry, Beatrix made it. Yes, we just got here! We had to make sure she fit in the truck bed just right and had to get a tarp—the truck bed _is_ clean! I made sure after—”

She gives you an apologetic look and steps off deeper into the apartment. Leaving you with… the magicat woman. 

You do your best not to stare.

She folds her arms over her chest. You can see her nails—claws?—very clearly.

“So… need help carrying anything else?” you ask in bit of a rush, trying to fill the dead air.

“Nope. That was the last of it.”

Her voice isn’t really catlike… is it? Husky, raspy, throaty... you're out of adjectives. There are a lot of different cats out there, and that means a lot of different meows… damn it, focus! “That’s good.”

“Yep.”

Silence again. You can hear, muffled through the walls and paintings and hangings (this place is fancy as fuck), Adora speaking with… Glitter? Whoever. You let your gaze trail over their apartment, trying to avoid the magicat woman’s eyes, but somehow that feels… voyeuristic. So you return back to her. You try a polite smile. (This means one half of your mouth curves up somewhat, and rest remains its usual flat line.) “What brings you to Bright Moon?"

“School and work,” she says, clipped.

“Sure. Where are you two going?” It’s an automatic response to hearing ‘school,’ but the second it leaves your mouth you already know the answer and dread gathers beneath your skin.

“… Bright Moon University,” the woman says, arching an eyebrow and looking at you like you’ve only recently emerged from the ocean and learned to breathe airborne oxygen. 

You force a chuckle. “Should have guessed,” you say. 

Somewhere in the known or unknown universe, some kind of meta-dimensional godlike organism takes pity on you, because Adora returns, finally.

“Sorry about that,” she says brightly. “Our friends live in the area, and they wanted to make sure we got everything settled. They can be kind of…” She makes a vague circling motion with her hand, as if someone else is on cue. 

“Overbearing?” you offer. 

The magicat woman scoffs. (Good-naturedly?) “That’s putting it euphemistically.”

Adora gives her another _look,_ and the other woman gives her a smirk and a _look_ back. “To complete introductions,” Adora says in a very ‘turning-the-page’ kind of tone, “this is Catra. My girlfriend.” 

You don’t miss the warmth in that final word. Catra definitely doesn’t either, from how her gaze rests gently on Adora. When she flickers her eyes back to you, well, back to subzero bulletproof glass. “That’s me, Catra." From her crossed arms, she lifts a hand. "Hey.”

Once again, somewhere in the known or unknown universe, that same indescribable, incomprehensible, omnipotent organism decides to lend you its uncountable strength, because somehow you manage to swallow the snort that threatened to leap out of your throat. A magicat… named _Catra?_ Hahaha, oh man. Wow. 

“Nice to meet you,” you try cordially. “So, if you need anything else…?”

“Oh, you’ve already helped! And we’re done, basically.” Her eyes gleam, somehow, with an idea. “Do you want to stay for lunch?”

Your blood pressure spikes. Catra’s tail whips back and forth.

“I… have plans,” you slowly utter, tone apologetic. “But… thanks. Another time?” Shit! Why did you say that?

“Oh—yeah! No problem!” Adora walks you to the door, exchanging numbers with you as you go.

Now over the threshold, you are free. You bid your goodbyes (well, goodbye _singular,_ as Catra is… yeah), and the door closes and you release a huge breath you didn’t know you were holding. 

_Now_ you finally go to your apartment door, turn the key, enter, and lock every lock.

The barren walls and unfurnished floors of your home greet you. You begin relaxing immediately at the sight of all that blankness. 

You kick off your shoes and sit down in the center of the living room (equally distant from two walls) and pull out your phone. You decide to turn to the only person on this asteroid-deserving planet who understands…

  


* * *

  


**_Conversation Between Leiter and Me_ **

**Me:**

_Bad news. Tragedy, really._

_I’m not the only one on the tenth floor anymore, what the fuck man!_

**Leiter:**

_k so the fire department has a reason to go up there if the place burns_

_budget is overdrawn_

_city hall in shambles_

**Me:**

_Worse than that…_

**Leiter:**

_hit me_

_lay it on me_

_give it to me_

_or dont, im not invested or w/e_

**Me:**

_It’s a couple. The kind of couple who definitely have friends._

_I knew it was too good to last. A place that was quiet and… mine._

**Leiter:**

_for someone who shits on brightmooners for being out of touch gentrifying snobs uv rly got that nimby yuppie thing going on_

_buying out a whole floor is what billionaire psychopath narcissists do_

_and ur only two of those_

**Me:**

_For the price of this place, I should get the whole story! I could’ve bought a farmhouse out in the country for a three months’ worth!_

**Leiter:**

_u ever think about how fucked the real estate industry is_

_more homes than homeless people out there_

**Me:**

_There’s more to it._

**Leiter:**

_k_

**Me:**

_It’s a human… and a magicat._

**Leiter:**

_k_

_and_

_?_

**Me:**

_Hello? A fucking magicat? Aren’t they rare, like almost extinct?_

_I’ve never seen one! Have you?_

**Leiter:**

_sure_

**Me:**

_Internet doesn’t count, you fucking millennial._

**Leiter:**

_all those nites of passionate cybersex didnt count, damn_

_what will i tell the cyberwife_

**Me:**

_I know Bright Moon is metropolitan or whatever, but… I never thought I’d see one._

**Leiter:**

_lol_

_theyre not pokemon dude_

**Me:**

_It’s not like that shit is in the census!_

**Leiter:**

_one, nobody reads the census but nerds_

**Me:**

_You read the census!_

**Leiter:**

_my coolness overrides it, u have no such coolness_

_two, putting ‘species’ in the census puts a target on the back of a minority population_

_bad idea, with racists like you around_

**Me:**

_Oh, so I’m racist now?_

**Leiter:**

_speciesist, sorry_

**Me:**

_Very funny. Ha ha._

**Leiter:**

_u turned up the heat in ur car and house whenever that one draconid guy came over_

_like he would freeze at anything below room temperature_

_and u called him a lizardman_

**Me:**

_I didn’t know that was a fucking slur at the time! He didn’t say anything!_

**Leiter:**

_he was too polite_

_there were humans who wanted to jump ur ass and he covered for u_

_how u figured it out the world will never know_

**Me:**

_I learned, okay?_

**Leiter:**

_learned like a windows 95 os studying philosophy_

**Me:**

_My lack of speciesism aside, the point is… fuck, man. I helped them move a couch, they have my number, they’re going to want to be… neighborly. This sucks. I live next door to them, I can’t just ignore their texts forever._

**Leiter:**

_just tell them ur racist_

**Me:**

_Serious commentary would be nice._

**Leiter:**

_k, tell them ur racist and sexist and decency phobic and think anarcho-capitalism is unironically cool_

**Me:**

_You want me to take notes?_

**Leiter:**

_how about_

_hm_

_go to school, go to work, be baseline polite, do the pleasantries_

_try for once in ur life_

_actually try_

_if they r nice theyll pick up how fuckin alien u r_

_if not u get some social practice_

**Me:**

_You make it sound so easy._

**Leiter:**

_lol_

_it is easy_

_u make it hard_

_u make everything hard_

_u even make texting u hard_

_im a hero for even talking to u right now_

**Me:**

_Why did you respond so quickly when I texted you?_

_Did you remember when I said I’d be back?_

**Leiter:**

_uh_

_dont make this weird_

_very uncool_

**Me:**

_Uh-huh._

**Leiter:**

_anyways just focus on the shit u need to do_

_control the neuroticism_

_ppl dont analyze ur every word or movement or expression_

_ppl arent out to get u_

_ur doing well lately_

_no backsliding now_

**Me:**

_Yeah. Fuck. Alright._

_Thanks. I’ll text you later._

**Leiter:**

_love u too bby_

  


* * *

  


You put down your phone.

You sigh.

You’ll have to figure out how to survive this.

Somehow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not sure what I was thinking, but... this is a thing now.


	2. Dreading things and getting a plant.

Look, you hate to say it, but Leiter’s right. (It takes a lot to admit that to yourself.) You can do this.

You rise up from the floor and cross the living room to the broad array of windows, widening a small gap in the blinds with your fingers and peering down at the world below. The sun has just begun to set. The streetlights flick on, a sunlight-LED-white instead of dull sodium-orange. One-color cars with license plates and headlights drive smoothly over uncracked pavement. You listen: no breaking glass, no shouting, no cars peeling out, no barking dogs, no gunshots.

You’ve had way, way worse living situations than this. You’ve had to live in unsafe places with dangerous roommates, to the point you’d lock the front door then be sure to lock the door and window in your room—and if they didn’t lock, well, you’d improvise with some metal and chain.

So, not having the _entire floor of an upscale apartment_ to yourself isn’t a huge loss. 

You put those intrusive thoughts out of mind. You successfully occupied your brain tonight with a revolving combination of reading, videogames, four different films you keep watching in short segments, and even a little studying here and there. Your apartment darkens and darkens until you finally have to begrudgingly turn on one of your (rather dim) lights. It’s Friday, at least. You can stay up as long as you want—not that your sleep schedule makes any kind of sense these days, anyway.

You hear a _thump._

Your head snaps up and your hand is already reaching behind your back to your waistband, finding only empty air. (Oh, yeah. That’s not really a thing you do anymore.) What the actual fuck was that noise? It sure as shit wasn’t the building settling or a pigeon having a rough landing.

Then you hear a _thud._

What the fuck? You close your eyes, try to ignore all senses but hearing.

… There. You can hear something faint coming from… the eastern wall of your living room. You open your eyes, head over to it, and press your ear against it.

Laughter. Voices, low and slow.

You sigh, removing your head against the blank wall. Of course. What the hell did you think it was? You’re so used to living in solitude on the tenth floor, any odd noise is a cause for going into high-vigilance red alert mode. You shake your head.

Then you hear… a moan.

You spring away from the wall as if burnt. Your blood runs cold, your skin prickles.

No, no, no, no, no. By the olds gods, _no._

You scramble for your room and tear through it until you finally excavate your overbuilt and overengineered noise-cancelling headphones. You slam them onto your skull, and… ah. Hello, silence, your oldest friend. This… is much better.

Damn it, they’re a young couple and they’re in a new place. What else are they going to do aside from break it in and mark their territory? Play bridge and go to sleep at 6 PM?

You scratch at the back of your neck. Well… looks like you’re sleeping with the headphones on.

Great.

  


* * *

  


You wake up with the world quiet and your ears sore. You groan and fling the headphones across your room; now the silence of your apartment seems loud somehow.

Alright, that’s it. You need something to do. Something to take your mind off… _that._ Something… constructive. You think for about ten seconds.

You decide to get a plant.

Yeah, for real, a plant.

Because, yes, your apartment could use some more free-floating oxygen molecules. But also because, supposedly, the human brain reacts positively to the presence of (living) vegetation. It would also give you a reason to open your blinds on occasion. (You hold it to yourself to not just buy a mushroom. Besides, people would get the wrong idea. Your fellow apartment-dwellers already give you a wide berth and darting glances.)

It’s only a fifteen minute drive to the nearest nursery. (You always thought that was a weird name for what’s basically a plant store.) You could walk, but you know you’d feel weird about trudging down the sidewalk with a flowering plant in your arms—people would stare, and that’s the last thing you want. Besides, you’ve never actually been there. If you need to mount a quick escape, having a getaway vehicle would be wise.

So you drive there, warm morning sun getting glare into your damn eyes from every reflective surface. You try to listen to the radio, but a night of pure silence still has your hearing sensitive. So you drive without music… or try to. You find yourself humming tunelessly, at first, but then it turns into something familiar.

_You got a fast car  
I want a ticket to anywhere  
Maybe we make a deal  
Maybe together we can get somewhere  
Any place is better  
Starting from zero, got nothing to lose  
Maybe we'll make something  
Me, myself, I got nothing to prove_

You grimace upon finishing the last line. You really know how to set the mood, huh?

You arrive at the place—it’s adjacent to a botanical garden or park or something. You sit in the parking lot for five minutes, building your resolve, psyching yourself up. You have to leave the safety of your car eventually. You study the sign on the front of the building; lovingly and painstakingly carved from wood, painted in bright greens and pinks and blues, weathered just enough for a kind of earthy naturalist aesthetic, impossible to miss. _Blossom._ Well, it’s descriptive enough.

You take a deep breath. You go in. A small bell chimes; you resist flinching.

“Oh, hello! Welcome!”

And there she is, setting down a watering can and brushing dirt from her hands onto her sundress. She’s tall and tan and freckle-y. She’s also willowy, which is a criminally cliché term to use, but in this specific scenario it’s forgivable. But most of all she’s beaming, as if she was expecting you.

“Uh,” you say. You try to look more confident by casting your eyes around the inside of the store. You blink. Most of the stuff in here is… less ostentatious than you expected. No giant carnivorous flowers or thorny jungle vines or anything… you know, magical. But the air in here is… odd. It smells like you’re _outside,_ and you can hear water running over stones somewhere. You must be hallucinating, because you swear you can actually recognize some of these green things.

She picks up on that. “Oh—we specialize in native plants,” the woman says, coming on over with long and graceful strides. (She’s wearing sandals. Vegan sandals, you note, made of hemp fiber. Of course.) “It’s really a shame how people import plants from different ecosystems without considering how they affect the local flora and fauna, or if there’s any chance of that species becoming invasive. Not to say anything about pests or diseases—” She claps her hands together, bowing her head forward slightly. “Sorry! Getting ahead of myself. What were you looking for today?”

“Um,” you articulate grandly. “Something… simple. Easy to take care of.”

“For yourself?”

“It’s… a gift,” you say slowly. Wait, why are you lying? Another automatic habit you have to break. “… For myself,” you finish, wincing at your own awkwardness. Oh, _hell_ —

Instead of the normal and expected reaction of disgust, revulsion, and demanding that you leave her property, the woman… smiles a soft smile, her gaze suddenly tender. “That’s wonderful. Too many people forget that one of the most important relationships we have is with ourselves. I’m so happy to know you realize that.”

“… Yeah, uh… yeah,” you mumble, feeling your face flush. 

She begins showing you around the store, gesturing as though she’s introducing dear friends. There’re plants that attract pollinators, plants that don’t need much water, plants that will withstand heat and cold without withering, plants with herbal or medicinal properties. You’re actually learning a lot. Like, more than you’d learn in a lecture hall. It helps that your instructor both knows what they’re talking about and clearly gives a fuck. But there’s something kind of intimidating about it, too; like if you bought one of these plants and murdered it, you’d be letting this woman down.

She gently prompts you with questions: inside or outside, any allergies, so on and so on. The idea of a plant that you could use for other stuff is kind of interesting, you have to admit. She looks at you—in a way that makes you feel like you’re being interrogated and dissected at the same time—and nods to herself. 

“With an aura like that…I know just the one,” she murmurs to herself, beckoning you around a corner. She holds her hand out to a wide terracotta pot, as if inviting you to introduce yourself. “Lunar clover, or Trifolium luminosum. Closely related to red clover and white clover, but it only grows in our biome. It’s beautiful, but you can make a tea from the flowers too!”

You… kind of like the sound of that. You decide not to overthink it—if you overthink, you’ll have doubts, and if you have doubts you’ll become hypervigilant, and if you become hypervigilant you’ll end up bolting out of here. “I’ll take it. How much do I owe you?”

The woman places a finger under her chin, humming pensively. “Well, taking everything in account, current growth, soil, pot…” She smiles mischievously at you. “It’ll come out to a total of zero dollars and zero cents.”

You stare at her. “Seriously?”

She shrugs good-naturedly. “First time customer, and first time plant parent. I can’t charge you for taking the first steps into this world.”

This is sounding more and more like a tribal initiation ritual. “Uh… thanks. I… appreciate it.”

She beams with a stellar radiance. “No, thank _you._ ” 

Okay, here you go. Be normal. Be polite. Be… good. You tentatively extend your hand. She meets you halfway and shakes. You can still feel the dirt on her hands, which is somehow grounding.

“I’m Perfuma,” she says. “Happy to meet you!”

Alright. “Yeah… likewise. I’m—”

The chime of the bell, once again. Your head whips around to see who it is.

“Hey Perfuma, I found the earthworms, but they seem kind of anxious about—” The owner of the voice stops shifting the crate she’s holding, seeing the scene before her. “Oh, business transaction in progress, right! Sorry, don’t mind me, I’ll just—I’ll just duck into the back—”

This woman is a fucking _tank._ Solid muscle, six foot six inches easily. But what draws your attention is that her arms don’t terminate in hands… but _claws._ And she… she has a tail. With a stinger. She’s… a scorpionid, holy shit. 

And you’re staring. Fuck. Salvage this, salvage this somehow. “No,” you blurt out. “It’s—we’re done, I was just—” You point lamely to the clover. “I got that one,” you finish weakly. 

If the scorpionid woman noticed your flustered state, she had the grace to not acknowledge it. “Ooh, the lunar clover! That’s a good one. If you put it under an ultraviolet lamp, it glows.” She chuckles. “Like me.”

Perfuma is already next to her, making concerned sounds about the apparently dissatisfied earthworms. You take the time to carefully pick up your new plant… friend? Partner? Spirit guide? You’re not sure of the exact nature of this relationship.

“Oh! I’m Scorpia, by the way,” the Scorpionid woman says suddenly. “I don’t technically work here. Perfuma’s my girlfriend.” Even looking down at the earthworms, you can see Perfuma’s small smile.

“Nice to meet you,” you offer. “Um—I’ll let you two help the worms out. I’ll get home and get the clover… uh, settled.”

Perfuma produces a small, textured brown pamphlet (you recognize it as hemp paper) and hands it to you. “And some information, to go. But don’t worry—you’ll do great!”

“Thanks,” you say. Scorpia holds the door open for you as you navigate out with your clover. You safely deposit your plant in the front seat and buckle the seatbelt. You glance back—Perfuma and Scorpia wave encouragingly through the window. You wave back with a weak smile. 

As you drive home, all you can think is _this city, man._ You glance over at the clover. You know, for some reason, that it agrees with you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You ever stress out about the existence of other people and get a therapy plant? Yeah.
> 
> I'll resume _Solace in Violence_ in a week. Sorry about the lack of updates.


	3. Naming a plant. (That's it. Just naming a plant. Really.)

You put the clover ( _Trifolium luminosum,_ technically) down on your kitchen counter.

You look at it. It looks, as far as plants go, totally fine. In perfect health.

You grimace.

What this means is that you really can’t fuck this up. If you do, you can never return to Perfuma’s store. Or anywhere within a one-mile radius of her store. Seriously, someone gives you a free plant that’s easy to take care of and you fucking kill it? That’s… that’s just grounds for going no-contact forever. 

You sigh and look down at the little brown (hemp-paper) pamphlet that Perfuma (very thoughtfully) sent home with you. Then again, ‘little’ is how you described it when it was folded. When you folded it out, it was more like a roadmap. 

Okay… you start reading. Clover has shallow roots (relative to other plants), so it needs well-drained soil. Apparently, since the pot Perfuma gave you is actually a pot-and-saucer combination. (And they’re called ‘drain trays’ sometimes? Whatever, that’s advanced stuff. You ignore that part.) So this means that the soil won’t just hold on to water, which means you’ll have to remember to keep the damn plant watered. Well, between multiple alarms and having nothing else to look at in your solitary confinement cell of an apartment, you think you’ll manage that part alright. 

What else… the soil needs a pH between 6.0 and 7.0 for best results. Your prior chemistry expertise is in a different field than botany—your main recollection of pH is that human blood is approximately 7.4 on average—but this seems simple enough. Perfuma provided the soil, so you’re not too worried about it. If anything, you’ll just go and ask her for some extra dirt. Besides, she said this was a plant native to Bright Moon, right? Shit, maybe you could just get a handful of mud from outside if it were a plant emergency.

Full sunlight… you glance at the blinds on the windows. It’s a sacrifice you’ll have to make for your new… roommate. You’ll probably need to _open_ a window for correct air exchange, too. Damn. This plant is accomplishing in minutes what Leiter couldn’t in years. When in the wild, the lunar clover prefers 45 inches of rain per year. You have no idea what that looks like, so you’ll just water it once a day if the soil seems dry enough. (Look at you, learning already!)

There more and more. Exact molecular soil composition (getting down to the parts of the periodic table of elements you rarely look at), exact oxygen/carbon dioxide cycling rate, the amount of solar radiation required dependent on the angle of a leaf… this reads less like an introductory pamphlet and more like an advanced research thesis. You’re getting the feeling that this Perfuma woman isn’t… just a ‘good vibes’ enthusiast. (There’s an email and phone number on the pamphlet. It says “if you need help, please don’t hesitate to call us!” It’s a 24-hour line.)

You still haven’t decided on a name.

“Am I seriously going to name a fucking plant?” you say to your empty apartment. 

Your completely empty, isolated, lonely, colorless, maximum-security apartment. 

“Al… right,” you mumble into that deafening and crushing silence more desolate than space itself. Talking to plants is good for them, right? They need carbon dioxide for photosynthesis or… something. “How about… Luna?”

Luna, the lunar clover.

“Okay, fuck, that was bad. Think of that was a practice run. Uh… shit…” You scratch at the back of your neck. There are different sexes of flowers, right? But can’t some plants reproduce on their own? But there was something about lunar clover being valued by pollinators, and a plant wouldn’t need pollinators if it didn’t need to be pollinated, right? Fuck!

“Barometz?”

Silence.

“Aglaophotis?”

Silence.

“Raskovnik?”

Silence.

“Sõnajalaõis?”

Silence. 

You sigh, putting your hands on your hips. “I’m not hearing any suggestions from you. How about some teamwork?”

The lunar clover, being a _fucking flower,_ just levels a judging gaze upon you from the kitchen counter for your complete failure of name-choosing.

You throw your hands up. “Alright, you know what? I invite you into my fucking home and this is how you act? Be that way. Your name’s… Umbra. Yeah, that’s right, a moon-related term. Don’t like it? Too bad, _Umbra,_ because that’s what it is.”

It’s probably your imagination, but Umbra’s petals seem to faintly, faintly glow.

Definitely your imagination. Maybe it’s an allergic reaction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me writing Solace in Violence: "time to research the intensity of directed plasma required to fully penetrate a specialized high-carbon steel cuirass"
> 
> Me writing (Other) Lives of Others: "time to research how much water clover likes"
> 
> Me writing (Other) Lives of Others: "how is clover this fucking complicated, plasma is easier than this"


	4. Trying to avoid noise, then trying to avoid ice.

You lean back in your computer chair, kicking your feet up and cracking your knuckles. 

You learned a shitload (compostload?) about plants in only a few hours.

Chloroplasts? Chlorophyll? Carbon fixation? Light dependent and independent reactions? Yeah, you’re basically the gods-damned expert, now. Umbra is in good hands. That lunar clover is going to have the best damn life a clover could ever dream of. (If a clover could dream, that is. Even in your great botanical expertise, you’re not entirely sure if plants can dream. The gardening-enthusiast forms you found were divided on the issue. You haven’t made an account yet. But… soon. Maybe. You feel like that’s crossing a line into a greenish world you aren’t totally ready for.)

… Well. That occupied your thoughts for a few hours. But Umbra is… a plant, you know—one of the most self-sufficient organisms to ever evolve on this asteroid-deserving excuse of a planet. You’re going to need something else to do. Homework? Read? Movies? Videogames? Draw? None of that feels very… _satisfying,_ after your extremely productive burst of learning about terrestrial vegetation. (You haven’t even gotten to kelp forests. One day. Soon.)

You sigh. You could exercise. It’s getting late for a run—not that there’s any lack of streetlights in Bright Moon, or that it’s even dangerous after a certain hour. It’s just that… old habits die hard, and you don’t want to be in public with your headphones in and music blasting in your ears after sundown. Lowers your situational awareness. Tactically unwise. Highlights you as naïve, an easy mark, what is academically referred to as a dumbass.

Sometimes you’re a dumbass. But you aren’t an easy mark.

You decide on a generic online first person shooter. That’ll kill time.

And you know what? As you sit there, leaning forward to stare into the countless pixels of your monitor, you eventually remember why you don’t like first person shooters that much. (Beyond acne-faced teenagers whose balls haven’t dropped screaming varied racial epithets at you.) Like, yeah, sure, there’s an element of motor skill application and spatial awareness and reflex and skill you can appreciate. But it’s just… avatars shooting other avatars with avatars of guns in arbitrary situations. And, you know, the gunshots don’t sound accurate at all. And the way the player characters just ragdoll when they die? The way it goes from alive to dead when your HP goes from a flashing red **1** to a grey **zero**? That’s… not how it is at all. 

You close out the game mid-session. (Let them believe you ‘ragequit,’ you don’t give a fuck.) Maybe there’s something more domestic you can play. Like… a gardening simulator. (Wait wait wait. No. Do you have a problem?) It’s 9:30PM, it’s Saturday. There’s got to be something you can—

… Hold up.

You hear something. Something… familiar?

You get up from your chair and begin wandering around your apartment, hunting down the source. It’s… faint, just barely there. And then—you _really_ should have known—you find yourself drifting toward the wall your share with your neighbors. But then it isn’t just a sound, it’s more like… vibration, coming through the wall. One you recognize.

_There’s some whores in this house_

_There’s some whores in this house_

_There’s some whores in this house_

_There’s some whores in this house_

Wait, what? Is that… seriously?

You grimace.

That’s it. You gotta get outta here. Your sound-cancelling headphones aren’t vibration cancelling headphones. You aren’t going for a run, fuck it, you just need to be not in this apartment and not near this apartment complex.

So you lace up your boots and grab your phone/wallet/keys and hurry out of your apartment, slamming the door shut maybe a little too hard. Maybe you’re a little annoyed, okay? You can indulge in some petty, pointless acts like that.

“Heeeeeeeeeey.”

You freeze. And, slowly, you turn to look to your right.

Standing there with a bag of ice gripped in each hand is Adora. And she’s smiling at you.

“Heeey, you!” she says again. There’s… a kind of wobble to her voice. Oh. She’s drunk. Great.

“Uh… yeah… hi,” you offer, slowly backing away. (But with each step away you take, she takes one forward. Old gods, is this what being haunted is like?)

“Perfect timing! We’re having a moving-in party, you should come over!” A sudden look of _absolute horror_ twists Adora’s face, and you almost look over your shoulder in case some kind of abomination has appeared behind you. “Oh, _no._ I forgot to invite you! And you gave me your number and everything and—” Her glassy eyes track to the door of your apartment—“And you live _next door?!_ That’s so cool! And so bad of _me!_ ”

The abrupt onset of self-loathing and self-flagellation and self-deprecation is a little much, even by your standards. “Um, really, it’s okay. I mean it. You’ve been… busy. You know. With moving. It’s… okay, Adora.” You’re not good at the ‘reassuring people’ thing, but it’s worth a shot if it means she doesn’t burst into furious tears and start hitting herself in the face with bags of ice as some kind of weird penance.

Her eyes refocus (as much as they can, anyway) and lock on to you (you resist flinching). “Aw, thanks. You’re so _understanding,_ that’s… that’s really nice, you’re… you’re the best, you know that?” She sways slightly.

“Uh, it’s—it’s fine—”

She gasps with a revelation. “But you’re here! So you can come over now!” She beams at this stroke of fortune. “And I have _ice!_ ”

You’re not sure how the last part comes in to this. “That’s—thanks, but—I’ve got to, um—” Of all times, when you need it most, your borderline supernatural ability to lie fails you.

Adora has both bags of ice in one hand now and drags you by the arm to her apartment door. (Fuck, her hand is all cold.) “This is great! You get to meet everyone!”

You feel your guts twist into boiling knots. Everyone? Who is… everyone? _How many_ is everyone? 

You’re about to unleash a truly incredible lie but Adora beats you to it by throwing her apartment door wide open. A wave of sound and light rolls over you, and you flinch. Your fight-or-flight response straight up fails to load and you do nothing as Adora pulls you into one of the deepest of party hells.

You always thought you’d die on a Saturday night, but not like this.


End file.
